


Galaxy Wars

by Wrockstargirl



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: #MMO, #angst, #family problems, #galaxy wars, #game addiction, #i'm trash, #in game dates, #in-game violence isn't technically violence is it?, #luke is a boss, #may add warnings later but probs not, #no one asked for this but me, #now look at it, #reylo, #stormpiolet, #this was supposed to be a oneshot when I thought of it, #unneccessary angst, F/M, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-05-16
Updated: 2017-05-16
Packaged: 2018-11-01 09:51:09
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,296
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10919382
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Wrockstargirl/pseuds/Wrockstargirl
Summary: After tearing himself away from his borderline dangerous addiction to an online MMO called Galaxy Wars, Finn agrees to introduce Rey to the game. You know who else likes to play? Just about the entire Star Wars cast. No big deal.





	Galaxy Wars

**Author's Note:**

> Hello! I originally came up with the basic concept for this a while ago, since I won a playlist competition for Reylo and got granted a 5000 word fic. However, due to some issues it was never written for me, and that's actually better, now that I look back on it, because it got to blossom into this lovely story. A lot of this chapter is build up, but I promise the next one has more action (I actually have this whole thing outlined so I know exactly what's going to happen and how everyone is going to suffer muhuahua). Anyway, I hope you enjoy this fic! Kudos/comments are greatly appreciated and I hope if you like it you stick around for the entire story! Side note: there is a dictionary of terminology used in this chapter in the end notes, in case any of it confuses any readers.

“Why does it take so long to load?” Rey asked, spinning around in her office chair. Ok, it wasn’t her office chair, or her office, but Rey’s foster parents tended to let them use their office whenever she wanted. Finn slumped in the other chair and kicked out his foot, using it to stop her spinning.  
“It’s an online game; there’s a lot to load” he said with a laugh.  
“Well if it doesn’t finish soon we’ll spend your entire weekend off doing nothing” Rey said, glaring at the screen to her side.  
“Well, at least I’d get to spend it with you” Finn said with a smile. Rey smiled back brightly. Ever since Finn had gone to college, Rey had rarely seen her foster brother, but he’d come back for a long weekend. “I think it’s almost done. You still have to go through the tutorial stage…”  
“But I have you- you can help me figure it out as I go along” Rey insisted. Finn sighed and shook his head.  
“I haven’t played in awhile; they’ve probably changed a lot of stuff since I was on last. And besides, I picked the Soth route and you picked the Jodi route” Finn protested.  
“Oh, the evil and the good routes can’t be that different; it’s just about how you play” Rey shrugged off his concerns. “And you seem to remember how to play the game perfectly well”. She nodded towards Finn’s laptop that sat net to the desktop, where his character was doing some mundane grinding task automatically while his animal familiar was hunting in the woods and gaining levels. The meat from the animals would periodically be cooked over a campfire nearby with a stroke of a key by Finn, who seemed to do it almost absentmindedly. Finn blushed and glanced away. “Besides, I’m not some noob” Rey said smugly. “Oh it’s loaded!”.  
They turned towards her laptop, where the loading bar had finally reached 100% and Rey’s character (under the username REY_OF_SUNSHINE) had loaded onto the planet that all players started on. Rey had gone with the “slightly cooler version of yourself” character design, as opposed to the “how you wished you looked” variation: brown hair; tan skin; and only slightly taller than her actual height, which was “egregiously short”, by her definition.  
“So, if you just skip the tutorial, you can just go ahead and get a job in the mechanics shop. It’s the best, since you’ll learn how to handle the ships quicker and better and you won’t get your ass kicked as soon as you get into your first air fight”. Rey quickly complied, her fingers deftly tapping on the keyboard.  
“Okay, this guy is going to try and give you a hard time, but basically no matter what you respond you’ll get the job; charisma doesn’t really come in until midgame” Finn instructed.  
“Or until I learn how to use the persuasion ability” Rey said with a smirk as she clicked through conversation screens.  
“Ugh, I hated it when Jodi used that trick!” Finn groaned. “It felt so cheap”.  
“It doesn’t seem cheap to me” Rey quipped. Eventually Rey was able to get off the planet and out into space on the cheapest starship she could board. (“You’ll get your own ship in a while; it takes too long in the early game to really be worth it” Finn told her)  
Rey and Finn were finally able to meet up in game and they started to play together. They’d been going on for over an hour like this when Rey said “I want to do my first ground battle”.  
“No way” Finn said vehemently. “You don’t have any of your useful fighting abilities, and you don’t even have your laser sword yet”.  
“I have a staff” Rey said defensively.  
It’ll be like trying to hit a tank with a toothpick” Finn responded. “You’re good with it, but it won’t matter, especially on this planet. This is one of the more populated planets, which means there’s a ton of overpowered edge lords preying on newbies in order to gain quick xp and a high K/D”.  
“But isn’t that part of the fun?” Rey insisted. “I’ll be beaten down by a neckbeard, gain a need for vengeance and will train super hard in an inspirational montague then come back and kick all their asses”.  
“Rey, this is serious. It’s no fun to just participate is this cycle of violence” Finn pleaded.  
“Let me make my own bad decisions, yeah?” Rey said, turning back to her computer with a determined glare.  
“No, Rey, don’t!”. But she’d already run off to engage another player. She sprinted around, seemingly looking for the most decked out player currently on the server. “Rey you need to stop” Finn said, trying to pull her hands away from the keyboard, but Rey just slapped his hands away and continued looking. Suddenly, she stumbled upon a group of characters, all wearing black robes with masks- a gang or cult of sorts.  
youre interrupting our meeting one of the players quickly typed into the chat. get lost or we will destroy you.  
I’d hardly call this a meeting; more like an interrogation another one of the masked figures typed, which was met with a flurry of lols from the other players. Rey and Finn could see now that there was another player behind the black robed ones; they seemed to be backed against a wall, surrounded. Finn quickly sat at his computer and started sprinting in the direction that Rey had lead her character.  
Didn’t I tell you? GET LOST the seeming leader, whose username was KYLOREN, said again. Rey grit her teeth; at first she was just doing this to troll with Finn, but now it was a matter of principle, even if it was just a computer game.  
Six against two hardly seems fair, let alone six against one she typed. Let him go.  
Against two? I dont see anyone here that would count; all I see is a silly girl with no clue how to even play another member said.  
Actually it’s six against three Finn typed, as his avatar walked up. Which for a pack of losers would be too much for you. Several of the group started to back away; Finn had an intimidating character design: tall and built, with glowing, god-like armor and a large broadsword and crossbow, though he had no light sword.  
You would team with two such weak, Jodi players? The leader typed, and it almost seemed as if you could hear the disbelief in his voice. Traitor!  
This statement seemed to send the group into a frenzy and they started attacking Finn, Rey and the hostage man. Finn used his bow on one of them to slow him down before drawing his broadsword to combat two of their number. Rey, to her credit, was holding her own fairly well for only having a staff: knocking down one of them and flicking their lightsword out of their hand and off of a cliff, but her weapon still couldn’t hold such technology. She was soon overwhelmed and was about to be taken out by a swing of the glowing red light sword when there was a green-blue flash, like lightning, that seemed to take down the one that surrounded her. Rey looked up and saw the flash take the three that were near Finn and the one that had been beating up the hostage man. It left their leader untouched, save for what seemed like a shove that made him land on the ground. The man gasped in surprise, and the flash left as quickly as it had come. A second later, a single line appeared in the chat: my comrades, take leave before they awake. Ben: do not try and follow or attack them; I will be forced to stop you.  
This seemed so shocking to the remaining masked figure that he logged off almost immediately. Rey looked over at Finn in real life. “Does that happen very much?”  
Finn shook his head.  
“Never to me” he responded with a shocked half shrug. The hostage man walked over to them.  
I am not one to question the great Energy and what it wills he typed. Let’s go. I need to properly thank you for saving me.  
Of course we would Rey typed. Let’s get out of here. And they left the clearing barren except for the numerous bodies that littered the ground.  
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~  
Who were those guys? Finn asked once they were all in a cantina, drinking some mead for regeneration.  
They call themselves the Knights of Ren the man, whose name they learned was Poe (or, by his username, “POE_LAND”), explained.  
Ren? Rey typed.  
An infamous king in the game’s lore, who killed all of his people in order to trade their souls for power Finn explained.  
So they’re basically a bunch of fanboy neckbeards with too much time on their hands? Rey commented. Lol that explains their behavior.  
“Be careful with the f-word in chat” Finn told her. “A lot of the more serious players feel insulted by it, even as a joke”.  
“Wouldn’t want to hurt the poor baby’s feelings” Rey mumbled. Finn gave her a glancing glare.  
That...isn’t entirely untrue :) Poe wrote. But regardless they are still powerful, and dnagerous. You don’t want to get on their wrong side.  
Like I’m supposing you did? Rey typed.  
REY!!!! Finn typed. You can’t just assume that!  
It’s not a bad assumption, actually Poe responded. They are trying to blackmail my guild into submitting under them,  
I didn’t know Galaxy Wars had guilds??? Rey said.  
Mainly for non-Energy using players Finn explained.  
Yes Poe agreed. They thought if they could roughen me up, they could force the Resistance’s hand.  
Any particular reason why it was you they chose? Finn asked. Poe’s avatar shrugged.  
I’m one of the Resistance’s main pilots, but they could have grabbed anyone, really he explained.  
kk Rey typed.  
Well, you’ve both done me a great service, so it only seems fitting that I should repay you. Poe typed. There’s an event coming up: an enemies unite challenge, where one Jodi and one Soth aligned player get matched up to do a series of quests over a few months. You need a code to get in, but I recently beta-ed an expansion coming out, so I got a few comp codes. What do you say?  
Would we be paired randomly? Finn asked.  
Partially. You can put down any player you would prefer, and they most likely will put you with them, just to make things easier on the algorithms Poe explained.  
Sounds cool to me Rey said.  
Alright, I’m down Finn agreed.  
Sweet! I’ll DM you two the codes, but after that I really need to get off. Thanks again for saving me! Poe said excitedly.  
No sweat Rey said.  
Anytime Finn offered. Both of their computers pinged, signaling the direct message, and Poe logged off immediately afterwards.  
“How about that? Does that normally happen to you?” Rey asked, turning to face Finn. He shook his head, an almost dumbfounded look upon his face.  
“No, no...that was....this entire thing really...has been straight up insane” Finn said, shaking his head with a half laugh. Rey chuckled with him .  
“Well, do you feel up to playing more, or not?’ she asked, spinning around in her chair.  
“How about we just use the access codes and call it a day?” Finn suggested.  
“Mmhmm, sure”. Rey and Finn found the event page, filled out each others usernames, and put in their access codes. Then they logged out and didn’t think any more of it for the rest of the day.  
\---------  
After Finn went back to college, they got to play together less, but it gave Rey the opportunity to learn how to play without relying on Finn’s experience. Of course, she still pestered him with texts like “how do I beat the crystal cave dragon?” “how do I upgrade my side weapon?” and “why do I keep missing critical hits?”. One thing Finn insisted she do while he was there, however, was getting her light sword.  
“I never got one, and I never had any teammates who didn’t already have one; this is like the one thing I haven’t seen in-game!” Finn insisted over their voice chat as they played. As it turned out, it was mainly a cutscene and really basic quiz that Finn didn’t even get to see, but he still cheered her on as she stepped out of the Jodi temple with a light staff, a really rare option in the algorithms, Finn told her. It had already been a month since she’d started playing when she got a DM saying that her “Enemies Unite” assignment was in. She called Finn as soon as she saw.  
“Did you get your assignment?” She asked with no preamble whatsoever.  
“Yeaaaah…” Finn trailed off.  
“What is that tone for?” she inquired.  
“You haven’t looked at it?” Finn asked.  
“No, I was going to do it over the phone. Why do you….” she stopped speaking as she clicked on her assignment. “Oh no. This is bad. This is really bad”.  
“Woah, ok, I mean, it’s not THAT bad. It sucks that we’re not together, but you’ll never guess who I’ve got…” Finn started.  
“No, Finn, I mean this is REALLY BAD. REALLY REALLY REALLY BAD. I might as well quit right now” Rey emphasized.  
“Who could possibly be that bad?” Finn asked incredulously. Rey glanced back at her screen. There, almost glaring back at her, was the darkly clad, masked figure that she’d met on her first day of playing Galaxy Wars; Kylo Ren was matched as her partner.

**Author's Note:**

> Terminology Used (in order):  
> Note: all of the descriptions are mine so if they're not entirely 100% accurate...well, there you go.  
> Grinding: a very boring task done repeatedly in game to gain XP/gold etc.  
> Animal Familiar: an in game animal companion that you can normally train to fight or do tasks for you  
> Noob: a new player who has no knowledge of the game.  
> Midgame: literally "middle of the game"; past the tutorial, basic stage but before the expert level stage  
> K/D: Kills vs. Deaths. A really skilled player, for example, will often have a high amount of kills over a low amount of deaths.  
> Neckbeard: a stereotypically overweight middle aged man that had no life outside of the internet/their particular fandoms, often wears fedoras.  
> Lore: the backstory of a game; the “legends” or “stories” that normally get told to you via non player character or some sort of written text.  
> Fanboy: a male fan that is stereotypically overly enthusiastic about their fandom.  
> Avatar: another term for character model.  
> Guild: a group of people in game with a shared goal or belief.  
> Beta: a “pre-tester” of sorts. They help report bugs and such so that the game is at it’s best when it releases to the public.  
> Algorithms: the code used to generate portions of the game, especially where it needs to take a certain input and generate a semi-random output.


End file.
